look at these bugaboos and made it possible for countless people furnish thatd to flourish as a result. i don't know how many presidents realistically have had thisimpar lives. walking around the white house grounds, i am constantly reminded about all of the people who have lived there before, and particularly all of the women >> first ladies, influence and image, an original series produced in cooperation with the white house historical 2, as weon season explore the modern era from edith roosevelt to michelle obama. guest: host: president obama meets with

kate middleton before returning to the white house. john kerry also here in washington. the new york times reporting on friday there's a meeting planned with russian officials to discuss whether the president will have a one-on-one meeting with president putin in moscow early next month. the associated press reporting on the first criminal charges filed in last year's benghazi attack, naming olivia militia head and others in the september 11 embassy attack that killed four americans. terrorism, one of the topics last night when the president sat down with jay leno on "the tonight show." it marked his sixth appearance as either presidential candidate or president. we will get your reaction to the president using "the tonight show" as a forum to discuss

serious issues. join us on facebook or send us a tweet, http://twitter.com/cspanwj and .-span hasbbc reporting yemen foiled an al qaeda plot to blow up oil pipelines and sees some of the country's main ports. the story was released a short while ago saying both u.s. and the uk have withdrawn diplomatic staff from yemen, prompted by intelligence reports over new terrorist activity. their u.s. is reported to send special operation forces for pop -- possible strikes against him and sites, al qaeda sites in yemen. the front page story about the

september 11 benghazi attacks, charges have been filed, u.s. ambassador christie vince among those killed in that attack. we want to get to the president's comments last night on "the tonight show," asked about benghazi and terrorism and the shutdown of the u.s. embassies across north africa and the threat from aqap, which is al qaeda arabian peninsula. this is the president and jay leno. >> one thing i try to do as president is not overreact, but make sure as much as possible the american people understand there are genuine risks out there. what is great about what we've seen with america over the last several years is how resilient we are. after the boston bombings, for example. the next day, folks are out there, going to ball games, making sure we are not reacting

in a way that somehow shuts us down. >> right. >> and that is the right reaction. terrorist depend on the fact we will be terrorized. we are going to live our lives and the odds of people dying in a tourist attack are still a lot ,ower than in a car accident unfortunately, but there are things we can do to make sure that we're keeping the pressure on these networks, that will try to injure americans. it is the first thing i think of when i wake up in the last thing i think about before going to bed, is keeping americans safe. host: that was the president last night on "the tonight show" with jay leno. ken walsh has written this piece available online that the president's appearance on "the tonight show", part of his effort to expand the presidencies outreach more widely than ever. other presidents have limited themselves to more traditional approaches such as speeches and

news conferences and interviews within the mainstream media. move deepeneda's areas as he tries to committee kate most effectively with the country. ken walsh is joining us live on the phone. thank you for being with us. this is getting praise in some corners to criticism from others. why so many appearances on the show and what is your personal reaction? guest: this is the fourth time president obama has been on as president. he was on two more times before he became president, which is six times total. i think the controversy stems from the idea he is doing these rubber untraditional -- he is doing these rather untraditional shows, not just "the tonight show" but this morning he will be on zillo.com, last week he which is aon, website designed for younger people.

he has been on other tv shows that are untraditional like "david letterman" and "the view" and so on. i think it is part of the white house's effort to reach out to different audiences who might not pay attention to the traditional media, people who might not pay attention to an interview that he might do with , would perhaps watch "the tonight show" or something like that or pay attention to really thatcampaign he is conducting and has for a long time been putting out his own view of events in his nontraditional ways. i think the controversy stems he -- it isa that below the dignity of the president. past presidents have felt going on a late-night comedy show is really not up to the stature of the president, but president obama feels differently. i think is on the right track in terms of communicating because

people get their information in such different ways these days, and he recognizes that. i think other presidents will do just what he is doing. oft: ken walsh is an author a number of books on the presidents. let me share with you the rights,on a blog their incredibly, the first question the president received on the situation in benghazi in the situation with the terrorist threats is coming from a comedian in california, and not from the traditional white house press corps. you touched on this a moment ago , but this is the first time we've heard from the president since those threats went up last friday here in washington by the state department. guest: that's right. within the white house press corps, which you and i have been associated with an members of for a long time, there is sort of the sense that they're being

bypassed, that the president -- because he does these other methods of communicating, does not hold as many news conferences or give as many interviews to the white house press corps, which is all true, but the president feels there are other ways of getting information. i must say jay leno handled his conversation really with president obama pretty well. he did cover a lot of territory, a lot of serious issues. terrorismlked about in benghazi, the economy, healthcare, surveillance and it goes on and on. it was not just a series of jokes. even withnterviews, late-night comedians, often produce some substance, which is what happened last night. host: any insight into why jay leno finesses -- versus other late-night show host? guest: jay leno is a respectful

interviewer. he is not a guy who needles even a famous person like the president. david letterman has more of a harsh tone. other late-night hosts like maybe jimmy fallon or conan andien might be to jokey turning things more later -- l ight. respectful and differential and he was both of those last night. his audience is middle america and i think that is what the white house was trying to do here, reach the middle american audience. president obama has been slipping in the polls, part of that is because independents have not been liking what he is doing as much as they used to, so you wanted to basically remind middle america why they like him in the first place. i think that is partly why he chose jay leno. host: the president will be on vacation next week.

any speculation as whether there may be a news conference before he heads up to martha's vineyard? guest: there is speculation. some of the edges were taken off now that he has done "the tonight show," but there's a lot of speculation he will do a news conference tomorrow or friday. con chief white house correspondent, the author of "prisoners of the white house" and a number of other books. thank you for being with us. the story is available online about the president appearing last night with jay leno. saying, the president making his sixth appearance, the fourth as president, telling me host the government is not overreacting and locking down nearly 20 diplomatic posts and issuing that worldwide travel warning after intercepting electronic conversations, raising concerns of the terrorist attacks. usewhite house has declined

the latest reports of terrorist threats to justify, the administration's broad intelligence programs in the u.s. and foreign countries, the president and his appearance last night did reiterate that such government surveillance is a critical component to counterterrorism. that this morning from "the new york times." let's get your comments and reactions. mike is joining us or actually, bobby from fitzgerald, georgia, republican line. caller: good morning. i don't think there's anything wrong with him going on "tonight show" and what not, but i do have pause when you see how quite he has been on the front when it comes to giving news conferences about all of these so-called phony scandals and stuff like that. that is what disheartened me. i get the feeling we're just looking at a politician -- that these things are all laid out and cnn has come out with this thing on benghazi now and

republican congress has gone on vacation and everything is just laid out for the people and he is always preaching to the choir. i wish you would stand up and tell the people where he was during benghazi and the irs issue, and do those types of things in a formal setting with the media, asking him questions. if you did that and went on the "tonight show" every night, it wouldn't bother me. host: independent line, good morning. caller: i'm a voice from middle america. as i look around my town, it is going nowhere. the problem we have is we have all of these czars in position that are pointed as far as donations and being friends and nothing is being done. on vacation,going i think congress and everybody -- as far as going on vacation, i think i was and everybody should get back in washington and work for we the people. as far as the nsa and the

information they leaked, the only time they become a thing is when it is beneficial for them. -- the only time they leaked anything is when it is beneficial for them. gave out they only information about how terrorists are being spied on. they know this. we the people have to step up to the plate because it is obvious that these people in washington that we vote for are not working for us and our interest. host: thank you for the call, mike. on twitter if you're joining us on c-span radio, heard coast-to-coast, we welcome your calls and comments. -- can call in

some other news, story this money, front page of the financial times in its first news conference, the president of iran saying is offering serious nuclear negotiations to try to break the deadlock, specifically between the u.s. and iran. we also found the story inside the new york times with the photograph of the iranian president. let me share you what they're reporting this morning. the new president used his first news conference to call for serious negotiations to solve the decade-long dispute over the country's nuclear program and he repeatedly suggested openness to direct talks with the u.s. have an idea until recently has been unthinkable for many years. more details available online for the new york times. democrats line, good morning. caller: good morning. --ust want to comment on your question is, should

president obama the on "the tonight show." why shouldn't he? he speaking to the american people about what he is trying to do. i'm taking note the republicans are doing nothing. to repealied obamacare 40 times. they've done nothing to do a jobs bill. they've done nothing. so his job is to reach out to the american people. vacation,going on that is such a tired, tired excuse. many times did george bush and other presidents go on vacation? people act like they should tell the president what to do. host: i wasn't making a reference to the n, but the fact there's been some talk the president even indicated when he met with the press corps a few weeks ago at a news conference that -- that a news conference

would be forthcoming, and some speculated to do so before vacation next week. that is the frame of the question. caller: you're acting like you can tell him what to do. he is the president of the united states. in this congress has tried to tell him what to do. host: thank you from the call. ron has this point -- how about reaching out to congress? former governor and former 2012 republican presidential nominee mitt romney speaking to about 200 donors at lakewood in new hampshire, the headline from the washington times "romney sees a shutdown danger." from hisaiser not far new hampshire summer home. he said in his speech, i badly want obamacare to be stripped of its funds but we need to exercise great care about any. of the federal government.

columbus, ohio, democrat line. caller: good morning. i was just calling in to say it seems with president obama, he is supposed to be on vacation. i don't know if i would call it a vacation when you're going to campuses and different cities and trying to tell the people what to do about their homes and their jobs and how to get -- better their city and communities. also, it seems to bother me a little bit that nobody's saying anything about this congress that may have worked maybe four ,r five weeks out of the year and they won't entertain anything, even the bills -- no bills will they pass, and now they are threatening a government shutdown. i don't know where they expect

to go. mailid, maybe i should e- president obama and say why they're on vacation, go to the hill while congress is out and maybe have the news cameras in there and talk about the business. maybe that would look better than him being on "the tonight show." host: the headline from politico.com -- >> well, it is significant enough we're taking every precaution. we had already done a lot to around theurity world, but especially in the middle east, north africa, where the threats tend to be highest. streamr we see a threat we think is specific enough that we can take some specific precautions within a certain timeframe, then we do so. it is a reminder for all the

progress we have made getting backaden, putting al qaeda on its heels, that this radical, you know, violent extremism is still out there. we have got to stay on top of it. it is also a reminder of how courageous our embassy personnel tend to be because you can never have 100% security and some of these places. >> sure. >> the country sometimes themselves are ill-equipped to provide the security you you want, even if we enforce it, there are still vulnerabilities. host: the president last night discussing terrorism on "the tonight show." this is from our twitter page -- many of you witching on

our facebook page -- many of you facebook page.ur you can share your thoughts and comments or call us. good morning from columbus, ohio. what brockant to say obama is doing is great. i want him to stay on the road, to go to these campuses and explain to the people what is going on. wary ofo very, very congress, like everybody else. i don't think congress should have went on vacation. i don't think barack obama needs to hold the congress in to get them to pass bills. the acolyte they need barack obama -- they act like any barack obama to stand by them while they pass these bills, when they got to the white house just like barack obama. i'm just praying that after this

-- i'm sure they're not going to shut the government down. hoping our country comes together a little bit more, people. they're not going to be a will to stop obamacare. ohio are arty signing up for that, so i don't know how they think they're going to stop it. it confuses me. i think we have a lot of matters in this country in this country that need to be taking care of and i think congress has been really, really slow on doing these things. thank you so much. host: this story this morning, the focus on kentucky politics. incovered in the event kentucky that included allison grimes, the democratic candidate and mitch mcconnell. the headline, "angry blue grass roots and strong rivals spell trouble for mcconnell." mcconnell is the senate republican floor general

and a major power broker. back, kentucky, however, he is possibly the most endangered member of the gop senate caucus at of next or's midterm elections as he tries to balance pleasing vociferous right-wing constituents with his role as chief congressional dealmaker. that story from "the washington times." we will come back to more of your comments and comments and "the tonight show" excerpts, but we want to take a look back at past president or presidential candidates who have made late- night appearances, including this one from his moment from 1968 as he was running for president, richard nixon. >> nbc, pitiful downtown burbank. hello, governor rockefeller. think we could get mr. nixon to stand still for "sock it to me." >> sock it to me?

>> from 1968, richard nixon running for president and excerpts from other past nine .ercent -- appearances your reaction to this president's appearance last night on "the tonight show" and what he said. patricia, republican line, miami, florida. caller: good morning. go ahead, patricia. yes, i was watching the program and the president going on television, i really don't care about that. what i care about is congress get to working to the country moving. host: ok, thank you for the call. from our twitter page --

thomas is joining us next from new york, independent line. caller: i think the president going on jay leno is a joke. he is the president of the united states. he should've held a press conference and talk to the united states. he should be a man. a story from "the new york daily news" focusing on some of the topics from last nights program including the president talking about his lunch with hillary rodham clinton and is titled the bromance with john mccain. keep in mind, she's been there before, she doesn't have to measure the drapes. he compared his relationship with john mccain as a bromance and said it is like a romantic novel. that story this morning from the new york daily news website. democrat line, good morning. caller: i am just calling to make an observation of what c-

span has been doing recently. i've been in this country over 20 years and so many times i watch the programs. c-spanhave discovered is does not really own -- oh anything to the cable people who are paying for you to have a job. every time you say anything, you put up topics that are there to disparage the president, not to help them get on. that is a change i have noticed. people, you to tell the the show from c-span is put on by the taxpayers of this country and our president needs all of us to work with him and not for you to always have the opposite reaction in the paper when anyone say anything positive about the president. it is a shame. we are one country.

i'm a naturalized citizen and i love america. all i want is progress, and we are not saying that anymore on c-span. thank you. host: your call is exactly why we do this program. it is an open forum for you to share your comments. when we did this program when george bush was in the white house, with similar comments. we are trying hear from all sides including your point of view, so we appreciate you calling in. press, thea president's first appearance was in phoenix yesterday. on c-ent is covered span.org. the president greeted by governor jan brewer when he arrived in phoenix. ralph is joining us from north carolina, democrat line. caller: good morning.

to comment on your topic this morning, i don't think there's anything wrong with the before theoming people on "the tonight show," because at least he is out front and the people can see him before the nation, trying to do his very best. my father told me the president is only one man, and he can't do but so much. people have to help him. i've noticed during the spring an summer, all the congress in different republicans around the nation were focusing solely on abortion and immigration. they were not trying to get jobs and pass a jobs bill to help the american people. i think it is a shame and a disgrace before almighty god. host: thank you for the call. another comment from our viewers

-- has an open invitation and we would love to have him anytime. a series of drone strikes in yemen, a piece written by greg miller points out the obama administration has authorized a series of drone strike in yemen over the past 10 days as part of the effort to disrupt the al qaeda terrorist imply that is forced the closure of american embassies around the world. the official said the revived drone campaign -- with four strikes in rapid succession -- is directly related to intelligence indicating that al qaeda's leader has urged the group's human affiliate to attack western targets. the strikes have injured in u.s. drone activity in the arabian peninsula has been relatively rare, with a seven-week stretch with no strikes, officials said it is not clear whether the most recent attacks have suppressed the danger. that is this morning in the headline, front page of "the washington post." another late-night appearance by another perspective president back in 1960, jack parr was the

host of "the tonight show" and senator john kennedy traveling to new york and appearing on the program. everything -- anything you wanted to do, you have been able to do. why did you go into politics? . i worked for a newspaper and i went to the united nations conference. it was quite obvious that all the great decisions made to affect the lives of everyone in this room will be made by the .nited states government it has been true since the administration of roosevelt that the government has played a role, were particularly since i.rld war ii the responsibility is heavy on us.

i cannot think of a greater privilege than serving in the house or senate. that said, the presidency is the key office. we have seen in the last six weeks, i think it shows the judgment of the president, his comment is, his figure decides whether we will live in peace or security, what our relationships will be with communists and with people around the world. it is the president, not the house, not the senate, or even a combination. therefore, i'm running for the presidency the same reason a ran for the house, because this is the place where action is going to take place, affecting the lives of our people. that was from june 1960, senator john kennedy just a few months before he was elected president on "the tonight show" with jack tar. more comments on our facebook page and you can weigh in.

host: check is joining us from texas, independent line. caller: good morning. usual, the beyonce party [indiscernible] spending big dollars to fuel that jet, then writes a billion afghanistan to

buy choppers and whatnot from russia, who was poking us in the eye. and only to find out 20% to 25% of those people in afghanistan not operate the equipment they are buying three at like the fellow said way back, [indiscernible] host: thank you for the comment. we are getting your calls and comments on the tonight show. his sixth appearance overall. he traveled yesterday to chandler, arizona. he talked about the housing industry yesterday in arizona. presidentpicture, the

still on the late-night trail headline. the president sat down with jay leno on "the tonight show" following a trail blaze said by many a politician. a politicians have been trying to reach voters through late- night talk shows for more than 50 years, using techniques fired by -- pioneered by candidates as different as richard nixon and bill clinton. and as president member of griffin, a longtime friend of ronald reagan, traveling to the white house for 1983 interview, here's an excerpt as merv griffin interviews ronald reagan. >> there wouldn't be any reason to be here if i didn't try to do the things that actually believe will resolve this. for years and years, long before i ever thought i would be governor of california -- in fact, never wanted to be in public life but i was out of the mashed potato circuit. i've always said in hollywood, if you don't sing or dance, you why it -- wind up as an after

dinner speaker. i always prepared my own speeches. i talked a great deal about the things i thought that government was doing wrong in our economy and imposing more and more on people. i thought before i came here that over the years, government had built up a kind of adversary relationship with business, with its own business community, instead of thinking in terms of partnership and keeping the economy going the way it should. host: president ronald reagan back in 1983 appearing on another entertainment program, "the merv griffin" show. republican line, your thoughts? caller: the president has been going around traveling here, there, and everywhere to get his message out, but i really

believe he needs to stay in d.c. and work with the senate and .ongress his being on "the tonight show" as an avenue to get his message out, but then says, i know it takes to support the president and he goes out on the road it is really eating up a lot of money, taxpayer money, for fuel and everything else that it takes to support the president. i think he could do a better job d.c. and working with the congress there. host: thank you for your call. talking about the upcoming g 20 summit, from "the new york times" secretary kerry and hegel meeting with the russian counterparts to discuss and obamapu-tin visit. pointing out the situation will

take place on friday in washington. there is this editorial, what is the point of the summit? not much if president putin of russia is not willing to cooperate. the me share with you the last sentence from the editorial. mr. putin will be the host of the group of 20 meeting in st. petersburg taking place september 5 and sixth, the president plans to be there free at but the bilateral meeting in moscow which is supposed to follow immediately after, as a matter altogether. there's no reason for mr. obama to attend unless mr. putin revives assurances he is prepared to address contentious issues in a substantive and constructive way. otherwise, what's the point? that editorial this might from "the new york times." tom is joining us, new jersey, democrat line. caller: good morning. host: you're on the air. caller: good morning.

i thought it was great seeing the president last night on tv. the 21st century. the young people enjoy seeing the president. he is trying to reach out to help us. it was a good thing with the housing, going out to talk to people. it is helpful and gives us some sense of security. being out there, i hope he continues to do that. on c-span, but just being at the white house, he can deal with all americans. host: thank you for the call. jan on twitter -- our next call is rhonda. dayton, ohio, independent line read caller: good morning. the reason i called, i am in a position where i work with people from all over the world, from indonesia, from mexico, from the middle east.

i have been there five years now and i've had a unique opportunity to speak to people who are from these areas who are now american citizens. and from five years to now, it seems that people were more and more disappointed with the role that our government is playing in all of these different areas -- no matter who is in the office. i have been an independent since the 1970s when i was first able to vote, but i tell you this, they are disappointed with our president. .hey are disappointed they see where the illegal things are getting more benefits and children are getting more benefits. there are people from the middle east, from jordan, lebanon and other places i have worked with, who say that they really aren't doing better in those countries to help, but getting worse.

their attitude toward the united states. host: thank you for the call. another story from politico.com from yesterday, donald trump hit the links with john boehner. the speaker played golf with donald trump, the per neale presidential tease -- the perennial presidential tease. it took place at trumps course. he said nice things about john boehner. donald trump will be traveling to des moines, iowa later this week. some speculating he is considering a potential 2016 presidential bid. there is this from don ritchie who tweeted -- here is an excerpt as candidate bill clinton appeared on "the arsenio hall show" in 1992. >> what do you like, the old

elvis or -- i know you are a fan. >> i lead a national crusade for the young elvis. when you get old, he got fat like me. i think it has to be the young elvis. that is when he had all the energy and real, raw, new, fresh power. it would have been a shame to do the old. it had to be the new. giving somelinton perspective on other presidents or presidential candidates, bypassing the mainstream media, appearing on the late-night programs another entertainment programs. we are getting your comments on all of this including the president last night for his appearance on "the tonight show." republican line, thank you for waiting. caller: good morning. topicue was about the

about obama pretty much for the young americans. i think it's more or less he is -- he is been dislike for what he has said and done for this country. i think more or less what we need to look forward is, would you say, our inner problems like i was unemployed because i broke my back a year ago. budget back. they take unemployment from the people who deserve it. i'm trying to get a job. i work part-time. another thing, i cannot get a full-time because of the issues with healthcare. is goingthing is, what on with the country is i think we need to look inside ourselves from inside the country and fix what is wrong with that. host: a couple of media notes from the founder of amazon.com purchasing "the washington post

." thinking outside the newspaper box, the family sells the "post." it got a lot of attention yesterday. puzzle, the story looking at what is next for the washington post but also what is next for the media in general as the new owner of "the washington post" will have the opportunity to transform how the losing money newspaper generates money. desperate need for a makeover. he brought the paper in a personable -- personal capacity. many expressing optimism he will be able to apply to the pose the same element, data gathering as well as his patient investment philosophy to turn his company into a powerhouse. and from "the washington post," this from the style headline -- kim is joining us from new jersey. good morning, democrat line.

caller: good morning. i think it was wonderful what he said about equality for all people and how we don't tolerate people being mistreated because of their ethnicity. i am so glad he is president. i feel he is one of the greatest presidents that ever lived. host: thank you for the call. ted koppel with nbc news has written an editorial entitled "america's chronic overreaction to terrorism." he talks about the challenges facing the u.s. and says --

one more excerpt from last night "the tonight show" and the president asked about edwards known as that investigation continues, your remains in is that- edward snowden investigation continues, he remains in russia. the g 20 meeting will be taking place in st. petersburg, russia. >> we don't have a domestic spying program. what we have are some mechanisms where we can track a phone number or e-mail address that we know is connected to some sort of terrorist threat. is useful, butn what i've said before, i want to make sure i repeat.

skepticale should be about the potential encroachment of privacy. the of the revelations show government has abused his powers, but they are pretty significant powers. i have been talking to congress and civil libertarian and others about our there are additional ways we can make sure people know nobody is listening to your phone calls, but we want to make sure that after the boston bombing, for example, we've got the phone numbers of those two brothers and we want to be able to make sure they call anybody else, are their networks in new york or elsewhere that we have to rule out? if we can make sure there's confidence on oversight, then i think we can make sure we're properly balancing our liberty and security. host: the president last night with jay leno. . we are getting your reaction. todd, wheeling, illinois. caller: i just want to say

president obama's appearance should not be a surprise to anyone free at that is because he is a celebrity. he is not a president or leader, he is a celebrity. a lot of these colors that call- in and what to blame the republicans or the republicans what to blame the democrats, the reality is, it is two heads of the same snake. that is the problem with this country, we have a dual dictatorship. we have a republican or democrat. ,e really need to open it up especially when it comes to the first presidential debate, have other candidates there so the american public can really choose. , you almost like you got can pick one of these two people. these are the guys who will be the next president. host: thank you for the call. you can share your comments on our facebook page.

gladys, georgetown, south carolina, democrat line. caller: good morning. host: you're on the air, good morning. caller: good morning. . would like to comment i am from south carolina. with't see anything wrong him going on jay leno or any other show, i think it is a good inc. and he should go more -- good wing and i think you should go more often. of angry about is the republican party not getting president obama a chance to do .nything the republican party destroyed this whole country and it is time for more changes. it is time to kick the dem -- when republicans out and get something going. host: thank you for the call. then you go back to the new york times website article.

the picture of the president. in the body of her story she says, the president's press secretary jay carney when asked earlier in the day why the president so often resorts to such unorthodox media outlets, press secretary said -- the viewers of late-night shows are not necessarily the readers of newspapers or wire services or cable or broadcast news shows. some of his most substantive interviews have appeared in nontraditional. thank you for sharing your thoughts on this question about the president's appearance on "the tonight show." he does travel to camp pendleton to visit the marine corps base there before returning to washington later today. coming up in a couple of minutes, we turn our attention to security and a top former department of homeland security official chad sweet will talk about the latest in the terror threats we have been facing and eliseo medina will be joining us, with the union seiu, to

discuss the group's effort on immigration reform. we continue on this wednesday morning august 7. we will take a short break and back in a moment. >> tonight. guestyou are an invited of the intimate circle of family or friends, you would be invited into the dining room from the drawing room. in,hear dolly madison would in an unusual setting for the period, would sit at the head of the table. her husband, james, would sit at the center. she would direct the conversation and james would be able to engage in intimate or lively conversation with the people to his immediate right and left. set fors table today is

8 people, but there could be as many as 20 people served in the dining room. that would not be unusual. indeed, dolly madison considered dining here to be so much more relaxing than entertaining and washington. she said she was less worried serving 100 people at montpelier than 25 in washington. -- encoreoing presentation continues tonight at 9:00 eastern on c-span. we bring public affairs events from washington directly to you, putting you in the room at congressional hearings, white house events, briefings and conferences, and offering complete gavel-to-gavel coverage of the u.s. house, all as a public service of private industry. c-span, created by the cable tv industry 34 years ago and funded by your local cable or satellite provider. and now you can watch us in h the -- hd.

host: we want to welcome chad sweet. former director of operations at the cia and homeland security. let's begin with some of the news of the day, the headline from the guardian newspaper, the united kingdom, u.s. pulled out of yemen over the they called an immediate terror threat. this morning the bbc reporting on its website that yemen says it has foiled now qaeda plot to blow up oil pipelines and sees some of the country's main ports . as someone who has been on the front lines on these issues, what is happening over there? guest: we are seeing a demonstration by the host government in yemen that they are serious about stepping up operations. we have seen that country have eggs and flows in its level of seriousness in attacking the problem. they did release this, you may recall, less than 25 top high- value targets within their country and i think this is a

good-faith effort to demonstrate to the united states the host government, which ultimately has the main responsibility for protecting our embassies abroad, is serious about doing that. host: this is the headline from "the pittsburgh gazette." what we've seen across the world is failed states or weak states essentially where terrace prefer to take root and terroristsense -- terrac prefer to take root and it makes sense. it is historic for a travel country and has had difficulty having the government extend control throughout the region. abuts saudi arabia, which has been a key source of tension in the islamic world mecca, one of the holiest cities in all of islam is there and has been a rallying point for concerns with the tight

relations of the kingdom with the united states. the combination of those two have made yemen a natural rally point for those who believe in the al qaeda cause. there was an overall for -- oval office session last week read our relations with the yemeni government is what? tense.it is i think it is gotten a lot better since there's been a tradition of power. the new administration wants to the samete they're not as the prior administration in yemen. they have taken actions that we're seeing today where they're trying to put their own security forces out front. we have also seen, for example, not only have a number of targets we worked with them on an accepted training, they continue to allow us to conduct drone operations. areof those are signs that

improving, but i think the recent visit by the u.s. in part was to deliver the message that we need to see stepped-up operations a lot of the intelligence we are receiving. host: "the washington post" reporting there have been four drone attacks in last 10 days and in comparison, seven months had passed with no drone attacks. guest: that shows you, one, they are trying to show seriousness. two, the drones have been flying at low levels around the urban areas to demonstrate a show of force. that is politically difficult for the host government because, as you know, the drone strikes have created some to mystic tension. in terms of being able to determine -- show to the u.s. they are serious, those are steps that are confidence building measures. host: ted koppel has written this piece, and the wall street journal --

said the country's capacity for self inflicted damage must have astounded even osama bin laden and points out there is always a nightmare of acquiring use -- terrorists acquiring and using these weapons of mass destruction that nothing would give them greater satisfaction that we focus obsessively on the remote possibility and restrict our lives and our liberties accordingly. guest: i think this is always a difficult debate. i think if we step back and look at it, since 9/11, the united states even though we are one of the most open and free countries , has remained, frankly, open and free. we continued to have super bowl's and people travel abroad and robust trade with our allies around the world. so this type of limited action, i would use the analogy of it is like a hurricane. forecasting weather

a potential storm and we're battening down the hatches and a few limited places. if the storm passes, great, but this administration is leaning forward and a way i think is professionally responsible and they are being advised not just by political advisers but also the cia -- one of my old agencies -- as well as dhs -- one of my old agencies -- and i think it is a limited response, but broader than many other actions we have taken. to be honest, it is temporary and we will see if it becomes a perpetual, then i think ted koppel is a point, this is just a short-term battening down the how to's -- hatches before hurricane. includes workme at the department of homeland security and the cia, chad sweet also worked on wall street for goldman sachs and morgan stanley. i want to go back to the issue of the chatter we have been having these references to.

some have indicated to, including saxby chambliss, it was reminiscent of the chatter pre-9/11. sincehas changed september 11, 2001 from where we are today. can you explain? guest: one thing that is changed, what is similar is we have been receiving a number of indications, a number of signs, like pre-9/11, and you never get perfect information in the intelligence world but you're looking for patterns like if you early indications and warnings. if we step back not only to 9/11 but just a year ago before benghazi, you look for and see patterns, right? 9/11 with indications which were indicating the method of attack. reports even specifically of airplanes flying into buildings. just over a year ago we had repeated the tests out of multiple countries -- egypt, libya, syria -- leading up to a

crescendo in the death of our ambassador in and as he, and partially, on the anniversary of 9/11 last year. this year we have a similar pattern where we see a confluence of those incidents like prison rakes in libby, in syria, prison breaks in iraq from all of which have totaled over 2000 hard-core terrace back on the battlefield -- terrorists back on the battlefield. includingation, direct information between al qaeda headquarters instructing al qaeda in the arabian peninsula to attack. those patterns certainly suggest there needs to be -- the u.s. needs to take a more aggressive security posturing and that is what we're seeing now. host: let me get your reaction to this headline. charges have been filed, when libya militia leader has been charged, two others link to the death of ambassador chris stevens and three other

americans last september. how significant is this? guest: it enables us to now with criminal prosecution in place, we have the ability to go to the libyans and ask for extradition of individuals that we are tracking and no we believe to have committed a crime. it will allow us to have a deeper opportunity to collaborate with the libyans. seen isains to be whether the libyans will fully cooperate in a request for the individuals indicated in the announcement. host: our guest is chad sweet. our phone lines are open and you can also join the conversation on twitter, facebook, or e-mail. bob, joining us from carson city, nevada, good morning. caller: good morning. ? hello? host: you're on the air. overseashe terrace have done nothing compared to those in washington, d.c.

the only thing that is going to start making sense is having a host: ok.ional amendment, a little bit off topic. we will move on, unless you want to respond to that. field,, rico, south michigan, republican line. caller: i personally think the american people are idiots. we can go to the super bowl in trouble overseas, and yet you have the tsa looking up our ass at the airports. guest: first of all, i appreciate that security introduces limited inconvenience. our colleagues are the filling a

very important mission. i would ask him the question complain people would about the tsa, we had to do the best to make them better and they have consistently improved on the overall professionalism, but their sole mission is to keep you and me safe. if i ask you this hypothetical question, what if we had to airlines. one is called no security and one is called tsa, you have a choice of which would you want to fly, you could take whatever risk you want, which one will you put your children on? at the end of the day, most people will say they would prefer the peace of mind knowing that after terrorists have demonstrated over and over again the airlines are one of the primary targets, most people will appreciate the mission of the tsa is important look like on that airline. every time i get on and as long

as they are respectful, my response, folks should be thinking for protecting us. i want to get your reaction based on this story published in "the husband could post" the al qaeda may have developed a liquid explosive. one official calling it ingenious. guest: of great example of where we can never underestimate the enemy. whenever we create a measure, they create a countermeasure. the back-and-forth between them.

we invested in technologies and procedures to try to foil a explosives and outside of government we are actively involved with people in that sector. what what we saw -- what was locked up -- underwear bomber, it took that incident, only then was it a political will to say we now need to use 21st century technology, which we have against the terrorist. and a world they only have to be right 1% of the time. we have to be right 100% of the time on defense. we should use technology purify the vast majority of detection systems are not capable of detecting this time -- type of clothing soaked in liquid detectives, nor are they capable of detecting the bomb in the

body or even something as basic as the underwear bomber. why is that? are of these detectors designed to detect metal. only metal involved is the detonator. if you are able to design explosives with no metal effectively evade the system. ages living in the stone for most of the detection technology we're using. forward thering technology to allow us to level the player -- playing field. the and a sadness that tsa sometimes has to do during putdowns. much of that could be avoided. in used moree

robustly the best technology we have available. for you personally, whether it is implanting the devices inside your body or liquid pluses, where could they come up with these ideas? who is behind it? guest: they are very creative. they're not just tapping the mind of one crazy person in one part of the world. they have developed a network. one of the dark parts of the internet, you are able to gather exchange ideas with each other over vast areas. the mastermind of most of the bombs we have been tracking is the gentleman who was the architect of the printer believees bomb and we he was architect of the body bomb that was used in 2007 to

attempt to assassinate the of saudiof interior arabia had. of thehe leading edge bomb making in the world. we have set up a combined exploits of explication sell. us, we of afor joint task force that collaborates to get the forensics of that site. we're able to attract a variety of different things. each bomb, there are elements that reveal who made it. driven,tivity being they have a network there using. network in own collaboration with allies, and that is how we will win the fight. the full value and

experience of the network we can bring to bear. host: this program is carried live on c-span radio heard coast to coast. we welcome the audience on radio. our guest is chad sweet, co- founder and ceo of the chertoff group. of staff and director of operations at the cia. susan and for myers, florida. thank you for joining us. am i confused that the yemen government did send the president directly, mr. clinton a wire of some sorts saying they had a high-value target there. he cannot act on it because of our relationship with the yemen government. there were basically, in a way

asking them to come get thehim? guest: think you for your question. i am not aware of that specific cable. that osama bin laden was in a different neighboring country. they did take up the facility where they believe he was to be holed up. i am not aware of that particular table. on our twitter page -- a great point jim is making. basically, you are right. in many ways it is.

revealed we were listening in on the communications between the leader of the team. what that unfortunately men is most likely we have their cell communications that enabled us to do that. means weation of that have bird that source. that source. you could imagine how tough it is to get the top leaders and a gold mine. that close to getting that close to the top leadership would be commended and is a gold mine. unfortunately would bring that source.

we will no longer be able to use them in future operations. they will move to different sources. damaging revelation that of communication is true these individuals. the second point is it is disconcerting because if you look at the sensitive side the exploitation when we took down osama bin laden, what you will , you see a correspondence and dialogue between osama bin laden and lt.. this represents 1.0. basically communicating to the tenets, to not attend the low- level attacks. focus on doing what i did.

basically folks that we need to get points on the board, show the world we're still around. there was a heated debate between the older generation and younger generation. now that he is gone, this communication that just happened represents a significant shift. this is more or less conceding the younger generation is right it will go ahead and use al qaeda as one of the primary operational arms, and basically rewarding them for the more low- level attacks like that were bomber and potentially the attempted assassination of the minister of interior and saudi arabia. for you aware of them at a

dead duck operation? -- were you aware of the metadata operation? guest: i was not. ♪ caller: my comment is everyone is mad about the tsa, but i love them. yes, it is an inconvenience but would you rather be in the air and your plane blows up? yes, they need an overhaul of the system, but we need them. that: think you for point. you are exactly right. some people might not like to stop at red light and an intersection, but we recognize we need some way of coordinating car traffic at an intersection.

right,int is exactly which is very few people would want a complete no security approach to the most threatening factor of al qaeda. there's an opportunity to make a better in terms of continued investment and professionals, to make, an opportunity the check points of the future better. those technologies are there, but we have to be willing to embrace and deploy them. they do not have some of those

technologies todayonfigured into all of those facilities. they need time to do what we did after the underwear bomber, which is for were deploying more of the advanced image technologies that can either do trees detection of the employee -- trees detection or imaging into the body to see if there is an explosive on a person. the department of homeland security form right after 9/11. other 22 federal agencies. 180,000 employees. the budget back in 2003 of $36 billion. employees in the budget of nearly $60 billion. this is a huge department. guest: it is.

those were separated into different agencies. i've played football in southeast texas. of alllike a team players with no coach. what the 9/11 commission identified was because we did not have the agencies on the home team coordinated, we needed a quarterback. that is the whole role of the the permanent homeland division. one team andem to one coach. the size of the organization should not be shocking. host: 80 from texas with chad

sweet. -- eddie. formerly with the department of homeland security and cia. go ahead. caller: i have a question about the tsa stuff. they keep saying we need this. you are taking in putting the whole country -- if you keep referring to people going through an intersection of a stop sign that have a choice. go to a different street. and you do not have that on an airplane. we do not have to airlines. if we did, i would take the other one. much trouble to go through and get down on airplane. you are not at war against us, you are at war against the people over there. again, i appreciate his

perspective are just fundamentally disagree. if you use the street intersection and the street lights, it is not the option in your town if you go to a streetlight and did not like it, you can drive around and go to another intersection. issue aroundal public safety is there. they are not there to inconvenience you or me. they are there to protect us. we want to make it at least inconvenient as possible. another thing if you will see hasirector pistol introduced the pre-check. i would highly encourage you to consider signing up. it is voluntary. it enables us to bring in

additional tools that we have that are risk-based screening. if you are willing to provide more information about yourself, you could be essentially it like a trusted traveler program. that type of 21st century technology and process is exactly the way we can make the airport safe and more convenient. >>host: another screening comme. that is right. today there are technologies that can help detect explosives in shoes, right now those technologies have not been deployed. it is not an easy challenge to fix. when the read did it the first time, that is what led to the

prevention. since then you will see a number of those for that type of technology to be deployed. i think the implication of what just happened this week with regard to the embassies closing, i think you will see revisiting of are we doing enough, especially at the embassies abroad, to deploy the type of technology that would detect a bomb in an issue? host: a question that came up last night with the president on gillette now, asking the press about how serious the terrorist threat is that resulted and the closing of embassies in north africa and the portions of the middle east. here is the president's response -- guest: it is significant enough we're taking every precaution. we had already done a lot to bolster security around the world. especially in the middle east or north africa where the threats tend to be highest. whenever we see a threat stream

that we think is specific enough that we can take specific precautions, then we do so. it is a reminder for all the , that this have made radical, violent extremism is still out there. we have to stay on top of it. it is also a reminder of how courageous that embassy personnel tend to be. you could never have 100 percent security in these places. the countries themselves sometimes are ill-equipped to provide the security that he wants. even if we reinforce it, there is still vulnerabilities. host: the president last night. chad sweet. one of the questions that has

arisen, why go public with the threat? the actual actions taken in response is one thing. going public of the actual source of intelligence is another. i think the latter will be controversial. and other words, it is not good it was revealed one of the intercepts was between the leaders of al qaeda headquarters and al qaeda and the arabian peninsula. ,he first reporter that came the administrative -- administration reportedly as the new york times to not reveal that information and withheld that information, and only after it pointed out it is coming out in different sources, the administration then approved acknowledging a more broadly. this is a problem. if we reflect back on the use

of offensive fibers to take down the centrifuges, and i have not read into the program and do not know whether it existed or not, but there were reports that were later released and confirmed by the administration for david sanger that an operation called olympic games was used to do that. those types of revelations are damaging and hurt our ability to operate. my friends in the cia are very upset with that kind of message repealed. it would have been much better to keep that quiet because we have now burst that channel. we will now have to find alternate ways. that was a gold mine to have direct communication between the leaders. point, why let the world know through the state department? it does not get into exact sources or methods but let the public know why they're taking

the actions there taking and what to look out for. the one thing i will say as a constructive criticism, we were in the administration, so i did not want to be a quarterback but we have an away game and home game. the away game will let the public know what is going on overseas. we also have a home game. vhs has set up 100 centers to keep them posted on what we're seeing abroad. there was no unclassified communication with state and local partners in the fusion centers. that is a problem. they should have done a joint intelligence brief on that. that means we need to tighten up the away game and home game. host: post from this morning. given the center of the terrorist threat. marianne calling us from pittsburgh on the democrats' line. good morning. calling about the

president. i seen him on jay leno last night. fromd not capture anyone benghazi now he is on the campaign to capture the terrorist attack us. i think he is nothing but a joke. he is not a president. i did not know what. he is terrible. he just made it worse. one more thing i would like to add, where did they come up with this video game? these parents have the right to know what happened to their children, and how the president -- i am not aware if you know this, but the president did not

sean that mother, smith's mother to receive his medal because she spoke out against him. they are telling her she is not immediate family. how dare him? that is the most terrible thing i have ever heard of any president. he is the world's worst. think you. not aware of that. i am sorry i cannot speak to that. soft targets versus hard targets, what is the difference? be a: the analogy would match in an embassy that is extremely well-guarded typically verses of conflict, which is usually smaller and in a more pro -- remote part of the country. imagine a police station or military base verses a school or

hospital. all have aities great facility. part of the problem when we put facilities abroad, no matter how fortified they are, there is an asymmetric red for the host government ultimately has to be responsible for protecting those installations. crisisaw and the hostage in the 1970's, no matter how many marines you have guarding an embassy, at some point they will be overwhelmed by the external forces. that is why it ultimately when you look at different emphases, they have different gradations for her -- for how hard or soft targets they are. in addition, some are in high- risk areas. part of what was taken in action is beth and value added -- they evaluate it which are most vulnerable and made the call

they made. host: a question for mary. how detectable a surgically implanted device speed? guest: it is hard. two primary technologies we have. the other one is traced this section. they can also go into the body. they have the greatest potential to be able to detect surgically-and planted bombs. the third, trees detection or proper equipment.

almost like csx, microscopic powder. those explosive detectors can be very effective. the three that we just talked of them are not fully deployed at an embassy abroad. that is part of what we have to have a discussion about. also the case at home that we do not have them fully deployed in the areas here. host: on the joining us from new jersey. democrats line. -- bonnie. caller: with a background with goldman sachs and morgan stanley, i am sure you are sensitive to situations that can afford an opportunity for profit. i do not think there is a big opportunity for profit when there is a culture of chaos and fear and ignorance.

there is a screening machine that did not make anyone say, but a privatized situation where a great deal of profit was made. for the most part, all of our national security now is privatized. this is not going to make us any safer. i think what would make us safer is being made aware of situation and having outlets like the old- fashioned kind of news organizations that do inform us. as far as the underwear bomber, he was flashed but paid in cash and was able to board a plane. i have to scratch my head and other various body parts about how that would happen with the expense of security that our taxpayer dollars are supplying. thank you for that.

we have had this discussion before. what i would say is first, on the issue a profit, when we were in office, we have no commercial relationship with many of these technologies and supported the deployment of this when we were in office responsible for protecting lives. now we are helping to provide private-sector solutions to meet originally the screeners at the airport were private and then made public. correct that point. on the question of the underwear bomber, you raise a really good point. the underwear bomber, there were indications before he got on the plane that would have signaled he should have been at least suspect. you are exactly right. that is an example of what i

talked about before, we need the ability to have better process and technology. on the process side, exactly what the tsa administrator is doing today what is called pre- check where you are able to get voluntary information provided by citizens voluntarily and that can build trust because you are able to get trusted signatures and algorithms to show the individual is not a threat. bomber.he underwear a threat with 1-way ticket and bought with cash. this should have him put into secondary screening at a minimum. i would completely agree that the combination of using the data and signatures is.

host: a comment on the twitter page. if someone wants to hurt as bad enough, no solution works for ever. take that and ask you isut what "the guardian" reporting with regards to yemen. al qaeda arabian peninsula, a acronym, howact as is this different or some or similar? it was set up by the no. 3 guy for osama bin laden. not in the forefront, not as visible. very close with the inner circle. became a very popular within the movement.

essentially an understanding that once he fled the united states and went to yemen, he became the face ofaqap. of aqap. they had a different philosophy than the older generation of al qaeda led by osama bin laden. initially there were in charge where the operatives would submit loyalty to them and they would only execute operations they authorized. they wanted 9/11 attacks meaning high-profile a conic attacks. the younger generation said no,

we have got to start putting points on the board. we're looking of relevance because we have not successful attacks. they had a rift between the older generation and younger generation. when osama bin laden was killed, the irony was he was acting as a governor on the younger generation. now that he is gone, and instead of being like a snake recut the head and the body dies, more like a cancer where it has to be put into remission but will take a lot of chemotherapy and attacking the cells. these have now franchise out in ay.ery malignant wel aqap.st being host: i want to ask you a final question in a moment, which is what worries you the most.

virginia next. last call from cincinnati, ohio. caller: good morning. i agree with the previous calller about profits they made off of the taxpayer. i think he is a very disengaged president when he should stay in washington, working with the congress. and why advertise these closings? why not simply do it quietly. he is trying to capitalize on it. all he does get the higher -- ire up of the american people.

guest: what i would say it is difficult to execute this brought of closings without having some type of announcement. my sense is that they have tried to make it known that so that those that are traveling in the region and those affected by it are aware of it. the second thing we do not know, there could have been intent to help with al qaeda on the back foot, which means the decision to let this be known was a way of telling the enemy, we got you. we want you to know we are on to you, and this action is meant to put them on the back foot to say we did not know there were listening in this close, therefore, we need to readjust and may even need to call off the plot. i think we have to give benefits of the doubt to the

professionals advising on this. again, i do not see how they could not have made the announcement without letting a broad number of people know about it, given the broad region it was in. and one of the best things that came out of 9/11 was better coordination on the way game and home game. they should put out a joint thatligence bulletin fusions here at home could use with mayors, governors, chief of police, etc.. they need to know what is going on a broad and how that affects them at home. we need toe is clear tighten up coordination between the away game and home team. this is are rare exception where it could have been better.

what does worry you the most? guest: complacency. we have had an extraordinary run in fighting against al qaeda. imagine yourself back on the day the/11 and then day 912 -- day 9/12, if someone had asked you would you be willing to take a million-dollar but that no one will die on u.s. soil from a terrorist act said years from now? the answer you would probably say is i will take that bet because i think it will happen really soon. instead what we saw is it took all the way until the fort hood shooting and the boston massacre most recently. that shows the tremendous effectiveness of what we have put in place. you hope success does not breed

complacency and the american public continues to show we are mindful and not overreacting and will remain vigilant in a thoughtful way. host: we will leave it there. thank you for being with us. when we come back, we will turn our issue -- attention to the issue of immigration. of represented of the employers international union will join us. our wednesday spotlight on magazines will focus on the department of homeland security. first, other news on this wednesday morning. >> good morning. senator chuck schumer speaking earlier on cnn that say -- says it is ok with the u.s. house sticks to the piecemeal approach as long as it can be reconciled with the version of the senate has already passed. he said we would much prefer the comprehensive bill but anyway the house can get there is all right by us.

he went on to say things are moving in the right direction, but whatever version emerges from a conference must include some path to citizenship for people living here illegally. the day after president obama talked about overhauling the nation's mortgage finance industry, the u.s. government is accusing bank of america of civil fraud, saying the company misled investors in the sale of $850 million of mortgage bonds during 2008. the justice department filed a civil suit against the bank and subsidiaries. the authorities say bank of america lied to investors about the risk of mortgages underlying the investment. bank of america disputes the allegations. an update on the situation in egypt. more than 10 days of diplomatic efforts to end the standoff with the muslim brotherhood has failed. on voice from the united states, european union and arab gulf states have been working to diffuse the crisis between the

government in supporters of mohamed more seats. those efforts have ended, according to interim president monseiur. morsi.mmad >> i am not an anti-sever person who thinks everyone needs to live in new york city. i was sensitive to come across as an expresso sipping elitist of some kind. not why i did this book. i understand why people like this ever experienced and the trends were so undeniable and the fact that there is a shift in the way suburban america is perceived by the people that live there is too big of a story to ignore. >> where the american dream is

moving on c-span to. host: our focus is immigration, and our guest is eliseo medina, secretary-treasurer of the service employees international union. thank you for being with us. as we look at the debate over immigration, front and center during the august recess as members travel to congressional districts, what do you think the immigration bill needs to include? >guest: i think we need to have a bill that would solve this problem once and for all. number one, i think it needs to allow the 11 million undocumented workers. road map for how they achieve citizenship as they go through the process. thendly, and new way for

immigrants to come to the country so they do not have to come through the desert and putting their lives in jeopardy. third, i think we need to have a way of figuring out how to have a sufficient view of the border to make sure we can deal with the drug runners, criminals and people who will do us harm. we need a way in which the workers can be ensured there will have jobs and employers can have a credible program for being able to ensure the workers they have hired are authorized to work in the country. host: the politics facing the immigration debate is front and center this morning. d.a.tory is a focus of king who had quit his job as an insurance agent to work full time on the campaign against illegal immigration in the state

of georgia. there is one point, this message to the speaker, saying it would be very great consequences for those who voted for anyone that supports a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. guest: i think it is flat wrong. there has been poll after poll that has been run. the american people want the immigration system safe. they understand the system does not work. it is very expect of, ineffective and inefficient. i think the people want this fixed. host: if you look at the photograph, the port the illegal immigrants, that sentiment is very real within the republican party and the politics of, petroleum house of

representatives. guest: i think it is a minority within the republican party that would say something like deport people because it will does not work. democrats, independents and republicans understand this. one area of potential compromise, a path to citizenship but possibly not adults. that isi do not see how a solution. who will take care of the kits would the parents are deported? it just does not work. what we need is a solution that is comprehensive that deals with the reality we are facing today. the way to do that is bring out the 11 million people. give them a background check. find out who they are, where they work. record, put a clean them to work.

host: when and how did you come to the west? at guest: i came in 1956. i am from mexico originally. my father came to the country as a guest worker, and then he came as an undocumented worker. eventually he was able to gather enough money and have been here ever since. host: in 1985 president old -- president reagan signed the last immigration bill. what with the flaws? guest: the legalization part worked great. think is they did not make provisions for how they would deal with the immigrants of the future. instead, they said let's crack down on employers but gave no legal way for people to come in

the future. we also built up a blooming business and fake documents. host: our guest is eliseo medina. spent many years working with hugo chavez. our phone lines are open. as always, that is the line for republicans. if you want to join us on facebook or twitter, send us your comments as well. harold joining us from mansfield, ohio. line for republicans. good morning. >> he leaves out one important thing i believe. the fact that they do not assimilate.

they want to keep a spanish speaking in spanish advertising instead of going to english like every other citizen did in this country. we have people coming out of mexico and latin america. they do not want to do that. they want to speak spanish. that is right. i think what we ought to do is require if they want to be a citizen that they learn to speak english. guest: first of all, i am a perfect example of someone who came to this country. i spoke no english. i came from a different culture. i came to this culture and learned english. i learned to become part of the

society. i love football. i love basketball and love this country. millions and millions of us do that. however, we are also proud of our heritage. much like the irish. everyone is irish on st. patrick's day. we have columbus day. what makess is america great, you can take people from all over the world and everyone contributes their passions and strings to make this country strong. it is what makes us unique in this world. president lobbying for immigration? guest: i think the president has done a lot to put this issue on the table. he can always do more. i do believe this is a process that has been dulled by the senators themselves and company

will be led by members of congress and the house, and ultimately that will yield -- yield a good product. host: when george bush put forth his own immigration bill, which mirrors the debate we're facing today and the immigration is somewhat similar, what are the lessons from 10 years ago or eight years ago? ago we didn'ts have the same level of support from the american people. at the time primarily american -- immigrant rights organizations that were in church groups that were advocating. today we not only have unions, we have evangelicals. we have high-tech. every bloody comes together. i think this is a pretty good representative of the american people to say we all agree. the system needs to be fixed. presidentthat under

bush, i think we would have had it back then. host: dennis on the democrat line. caller: i was just wondering, this gentleman said he came in legally. that is the problem, the illegal aliens -- illegal aliens are what we're talking about. they're all back for the came either before or after going to prison -- present or send them back and let them start out and come back legally. why should they jump to the end of the line when all the other people are trying to get into the country illegally -- trying to come into the country legally what it pushed back? host: thank you, dennis.

guest: let me just say, no one will get a free ride out of this one. the senate bill that was just passed, a very legalistic path. it will take a total of 13 years. during that time they need background checks to make sure we know who they are in what the intentions are. we want to make sure they have a job and do not have a criminal record. theywill also pay a fine will pay the full cost of legalization process. time ofhat legalization, they are basically does candidates for citizens. it will not automatically be citizens. they will go through all of this, and it is an earned at citizenship. not something they will be given. the second thing, i would say we

need to keep in mind if we were to deport the 11 million people, first of all, it would be hugely expensive. it would cost billions and billions of dollars, but let's assume we wanted to do that. what we would wind up with is that agriculture would collapse. cost to produce would skyrocket. a huge number, perhaps as much as 75% of the industry is undocumented. they are working and contributing and helping to create jobs. that, the able to do economy would collapse. finally, i do not think that is who we are in america. if we have a lot -- jobs that is not working, we fix it. our guest is eliseo medina

. how do you beagles' pay state and medicare and so security taxes? how did they file a legal tax return each year? guest: if they have a job, and a large number of them do, their taxes are automatically deducted from the paychecks as a matter of fact, every year they contribute billions of dollars through social security, which they will never be able to claim one single penny because they are undocumented. so when they file income taxes using taxpayer identification number. so they are in fact paying income taxes, as well as social security but when they go get gasoline for the car, they pay transportation taxes. if they own a home, which some of them do because they live in blended families, the spouse may

be an american citizen, they pay property taxes. this is a group of people that are here contributing for, yet because of the status they do not have the same benefits of the rest of us. the worst part, there are a lot of employers that take good vantage of the undocumented status to exploit them. some of them pay under the table. they do not contribute because of the system set up by employers, but also in a situation where if they get injured, they do now have worked in compensation they will have no insurance because of the status. this is a system that is rife with exploitation and ripe for corruption. i think that is why we need to fix it. >> talking about the immigration issue. our guest is from the employers international union. mary joining us from florida. good morning.

i am down here in florida now and have been down here for three years. and i have seen a lot of mexicans, and and see them go to the tomato packing plants and see them work and work. they are workers, hard workers they have gotten now to where they're going in and taking workers and taking them right out of the factories. needless to say, florida is falling short on employers because no other nomination, no blacks, and nobody mexicans,for them the they do not work, i have seen them work in these tomato plants appear. i have seen them work hard. they work long hours.

even when it is still daylight. they're still working if they can come up and getting now where they cannot even get a job because they are deporting them. run, shemother on the was up here and was up here illegally. somehow it came down the line and she got caught. in the meantime, her son, grandchildren, all of them are still up here. andpoor, and, 86-years-old, they took her back to mexico. sharing thatou for story. aest: let me tell you, i was farm worker. i used to pick grapes and made those for a living when i was younger. i know how difficult it is. i also know that the pay is very low, so most people can find something else and would rather

do that. thever, we do need vegetables and produce in our stores so that consumers can have the food supply that they need. them,agedy is why we need we're not creating the conditions that would protect the human and working rights, but that also allow the employers to take advantage of them to have an unfair competitive advantage over the competition. that is not a good way for us to continue working. i think as time goes on the american people are beginning to understand we need to fix it. host: let me ask you about your experience in the late 1960's and 1970's working on various firms in your relationship with hugo chavez. when was this taken? that was taken right

around 1973. a much younger man at that time. i was fortunate to have made it through the farm workers union. worker, i was so sick and tired of the mistreatment of ,he low wages, the exploitation that i join them. i wanted to have a change. country as an immigrant. if you work hard, did the right thing, you could have a little piece of the american dream. for me, meeting hugo chavez gave me the confidence in the ability to actually go out and try and work hard to try to do better for my family. i am so grateful for him, because he not only did a lot for workers across this country, but he changed my life.

>> the way it's going i'm struggling to learn spanish. i think the more we can

communicate with the rest of the world, the better we are positioned as a country and as a worker to be able to advance ourselves and capacity as working people. >> monty is weighing in as well. saying it is time to make spanish a must study in high school and to make english and spanish official languages. mark, did you want to follow up? caller: i want english to be the language of the country and spanish, no. host: phillip is next from henderson, nevada. caller: i'm not a mexican-american. i'm american with hispanic. as long as we continue to put race in front of america, we will continue to have racism. my grandfather came across the

border illegally he told us we're here because our country did not take care of us. therefore this is our country. you speak english. i lived in vegas. i can go to denny's, i can go to wendy's, i can go everywhere my children used to go and have jobs there during the summer. now they can't because illegals are working there. we need to fix the border. kennedy put a bill in, it was never enforced. what makes we will enforce the next one. we should have modified the existing one and enforce the borders. my friends on the border, they work with the border patrol and they say when the fence was put up, the immigrants came across and the flow came down.

he said because it does work. that's all i got to say. all i hear is everybody keep wanting to make the bills. they don't enforce the bills. when they get out of office, they get pat on the back because the lobbyist pay them to get the bills passed. no one enforces the bills. just like the gun laws and they don't want to enforce. they want to create more laws. host: let me use his point to put some numbers on the screen and get reaction with regard to the laws on the book and the president own record of deportation. this is according to the opposite of immigration, custom enforcement known as i.c.e. 410,000 illegal immigrants moved during the president's term in office. 70, 70,000 individuals were illegally caught crossing the border and 44,000 illegal

immigrants deported during august 2013, this month alone. guest: that's the problem with this law that we have today. it doesn't work. it's not working. the fact that you are having -- people have no way to come to this country legally. we ought to create a legal pathway so that the immigrants of the future can come here. secondly, the people that are being arrested and deported, a lot of them had kids born this country. they're being separated from their families. who takes care of those kids if you deport the parents? does that become the responsibility of the government and the taxpayers? these are people who are working hard, but they have no other way of getting here except through this broken immigration system. if we fix it, we wouldn't those problems, we wouldn't an immigration system that's so expensive, we're spending $18 billion a year right now. the senate bill would increase that to 49 billion dollars a

year. host: let me go back to these numbers, 225,000 immigrants removed from the u.s. since the president has been in office because of their criminal record and 44,000 illegal immigrants this month alone removed. guest: you need to look at the few years. first of all i am all for deporting and arresting people who are criminals. who have come here and committed felonies. the question is, when you say criminal record, somebody came in undocumented, that is considered a criminal record and a violation and therefore subject to deportation. but statistics that i see show that 40% and 50% of the people

being deported did not have violations except illegal entry. they might have had a misdemeanor and they ought to pay the price for those misdemeanors but, generally, those are not what you would consider a felonies and serious violation of the law. that's why i say when we get this law, we will have background checks. we will catch those people who are here and violating the law and they can be deported. host: our next caller is mike from louisiana, independent line, good morning. caller: hello. i like some of the points he makes. i need to get this man to go out and ask women to go out with me. host: we'll put that in the form of a question and get a response. caller: okay. start back with a little bit of

time that he's put on. he said that there was no problem having your own culture. that's all fine. i'm from louisiana, i'm suppose to be french-english but i don't wear a beret. i'll let him speak a little bit. guest: there's nothing in the law that requires spanish or any other language to be spoken. i watch spanish language television but only about 10% of the time. 90% of the time i'm watching english language television, english language radio. we are part of this country. i think if you look at the vast

majority of us, we're here like generations of immigrants before us and we're proud of who we are and we're also proud to be minors. host: is it different today than those from the turn of the 20th century for irish, italian and germans who had their own neighborhoods but simulated in all learned english. we do have a country not evenly divided but certainly a lot of americans who have spanish as their native tongue. it's different today than it was 70 or 80 years ago. guest: i can tell you in the latino community, we are simulating, we're becoming part of this society. by us, we're also contributing to the culture of this country. we now have salsa as one of the

most popular condiments in this country. we're a combination of many people that create a unique experiment in this world. we should appreciate the diversity of a country because it makes us stronger. host: republican line. our guest is with the service employees international union, good morning. caller: how are you today? i have a comment. i think that a child who comes here illegal to this country should have a path to citizenship. but an adult who comes illegally should be able to stay here in some sort of legal status and not be separated from their family. but if someone who came here illegally as an adult wants to

become an american citizen, i think they should have to go back to where they came from and apply in the proper channel. if they don't want to do that, then stay here and some sort of legal status. there's a continual being here illegally and a lot in between. that's what i think. guest: i appreciate your comment. let me just tell you that one of the strengths of america is that everybody in this country is equal. that everybody that come here who correct eventually becomes part of us. part of our society. the people that came to this country a long time ago, they came however they could because they were seeking liberty, freedom or opportunity. those immigrants are no different. we want to maintain that opportunity for everybody to

integrate and simulate. if we create a permanent underclass, that changes who we are as a country and people. i think that will require a lot more conversation before we went down that road. host: benny from north carolina, go ahead betty. caller: i don't have anything against legal ones but the ones who are illegal, i don't think its right. about 10 years ago we had a business and we hired a lot of people from mexico. then every quarter the government would send us this paper telling us these people doesn't have correct social security numbers. we would let them go. it wouldn't be two or three days, they will be back working somewhere else. they will go downtown and buy all kinds of i.d. for $55. they laugh about it. they thought it was funny.

i think if we took all of these illegal mexicans and sends them back and take the people off unemployment and let them fill those jobs and make them fill those jobs. work is work. i think that will take care of two problems at one time. guest: let me just say, we keep putting your finger on the problem. there is a system right thousand that doesn't work. it doesn't work for business. if a business person hires somebody, they need that person to be there. they need them to do the job they were hired to do. what happens, when you have committed workers, then the government does a check. you got to fire them. you got to find somebody else but that person finds another job. what you are doing is turning the workforce and creating a huge problem for business but not solving the problem. i view that as a issue.

the other thing is that what happened in alabama, when they passed house bill 56, which was intended to make it difficult for undocumented workers, they went and got people from the unemployment office and come and work. they only stayed half a day sometimes less because the work is hard and the wages are low. these employees are used to doing work of undocumented workers who had no choice. we need to be able to fix it so that everybody can help with the responsibilities and you will not have a workforce that can be used to lower standards. host: your union released a photograph of you being arrested. part of a series of demonstrations and drawing attention to immigration. what can we expect this month as lawmakers head back home? guest: we are going to be

engaging in democratic tradition. we are going to be communicating with our members of congress, talking to them about why the system doesn't work and why we need to fix it. we have about 360 events that are going to be held all over the country. everyday there's more and more of them happening in congressional districts. there's going to be a big conversation we're going to be having with the congress because when they come back in september, we need them to bear down and actually have a serious conversation about this problem and what we need to do to fix it. host: maria next in california, republican line. caller: good morning. i'm calling in because i would like for him to answer this question. who pays for all these people that come into this country, who pays for them to give birth here? 's thing is, these elderly people come in too and they have

kids. they go on the w.i.c. program and the welfare because they have kids from the united states. but it doesn't make no sense that the people are legal but yet they keep having kids and they say, oh no, we have kids from here. it should be illegal for anybody that's not legal to give birth in this country if they're not a citizen here. guest: you know, first of all, people do have children. people want to be able to take care of their families. who pays, i think, is a really difficult question. some of them may go to the emergency room because they have no health insurance. they get uncompensated care, which means that the hospital eventually, those of us who have insurance, wind up paying for

that bill. but there are a lot of them that pay for their bills themselves. they save a few dollars. i think this is another thing we need to think about. our current health system in this country also needs a lot of work. host: i wonder if anything will get done with regard to immigration. if that happens and if congress and president fail to reach an agreement, then what? guest: i do think there will be something done. i'm an optimist. i think the congress will understand they need to do something. but at the end of the day, this issue is going to have to be addressed. i am convinced it will be. only discussion now is when and what does it look like. i'm hoping we get this done sooner rather than later.

host: eliseo medina who is secretary employee of service employees international union. today we're going to focus on the department of homeland security, a piece written by devin leonard of bloomberg business week. we'll be joining us from new york city. first a news update from c-span radio. >> this just coming across the news hour. president obama is canceling plans to meet with russian president vladimir putin in moscow. the move is in retribution for russia to grant temporary asylum to edward snowden. the president have no plans to meet with president putin there one on one. the president will be stopping in sweden early september. yesterday the president delivered a speech in phoenix where he said for the first time he's endorsing an approach to remake the howing finance system. fannie mae and freddie mac wound

down. word this hour fannie mae earned $5 billion from april through march. the seventh straight profitable quarter for the mortgage giant. the gain was due largely to increased profits from investments made to hedge against rising interest rates. that helped offset losses on mortgages during the quarter. freddie will pay a dividend of $4.5 billion to the u.s. treasury next month and is requesting no additional aide. the government rescues freddie and larger fannie mae in may. the housing recovery that began last year was made most profitable last year. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. >> 150 years ago, our nation was

engaged in a civil war. yet, in 1963, our nation was reminded of its revolutionary past. one of those entry gans of the midnight ride of paul revere. in 1963 it was being elevated. however at the same time, the revere name was is being chastised because one of paul revere's grandsons, joseph warren revere of the army of potomac is up for a court-martial for his action in early may of 1863. how did this grandson of one of our revolutionary war heroes get in such a mess?

>> the life of union joseph revere. part of american history tv every weekend on c-span 3. host: every wednesday we focus our spot light on magazines. we want to focus on bloomberg business week. this article, the department of homeland security is moving here. devin leonard is joining us from new york. thank you so much for being with us. guest: thanks for having me. host: you say, it is increasingly apparent that dhs is inherently flawed. some will say it is crazy. can you respond? guest: well, those are words i wrote in the piece. the department homeland security

is building a new headquarters in the site of a mental institution in washington d.c. it's off the campus of st. elizabeth hospital former mental institution. it's a beautiful site. it's 176 acres. it over looks the downtown d.c. area, the view is great. there's a civil war battlefield. there's deer and wild turkey. in the midst of all of that, there's a mental institution they're slowly refurbishing to house the department of homeland security. there have been lots of problems. host: let's go through some of the problems. what did you learn? guest: well, essentially, the dhs had this problem when they were created by congress in 2002. they were combining 22 different

federal agencies into one. one of the issues early on was that, i guess you know you do this all on paper but then everybody sitting in air old offices all around d.c. it became apparent especially after hurricane katrina, they need to put everybody into one location. that's when they chose the st. elizabeth campus. the real problem. it's an historic campus. the original plan according to historic preservation i talked to was for the dhs to demolish two-thirds of the building. it slowed the whole project down and the recession time and ever since then they had difficulty getting funding. right now the project isn't suppose to be finished until 2006. in the meantime, the budget for

the whole project has gone from $3.4 billion to $4.5 billion. in the meantime, the dhs can't integrate. host: this is a photograph of the ground breaking ceremony that took place back in 2009. when i first saw that you had wrote 2026, i thought that was a typo. why so long? we're talking about another 13 years. guest: well, it's just an enormous project and it's the biggest construction project since the pentagon was completed in 1943. it's going to take a tremendous amount of work. it's a lot of restoring of these old buildings. it's a lot of money and they had a lot of difficulty getting the funding. most of the funding from the coast guard headquarters came from the stimulus act in 2009.

ever sense then, the funding has been choked off. as they delay the cost of everything goes up. you right, that is a really long time and clearly i was amazed when i heard that too. that's what they're saying and they're trying to move slowly and get smaller amounts of money so they can keep it going. they had to move everything back. host: where is dhs at the moment? guest: they're in a former u.s. navy complex in nebraska avenue in washington d.c. host: you write, dhs has become a study in mismanagement. there were frequent interagency.

guest: yes. i don't think anybody forgotten what happened in hurricane katrina. i was covering that at the time and wal-mart got food and water into the flood zone and the flood victims before fema did. fema was once highly respected federal agency that responded quickly. once it was put into the middle of this huge bureaucracy, it just couldn't move as fast. we saw what happened and that was emblematic of sort of the dysfunction the dhs. it's gotten better but there are still a lot of problems. host: our focus is the department of homeland security. our guest is devin leonard who wrote the piece on bloomberg business week. our focus is spotlight magazine. shannon is joining us from new

york, democrats line good morning. caller: on the twin towers and 9/11. host: the caller making the point about the collapse of the twin towers on 9/11. we're going to move on to berry joining us from florida independent lean good morning. caller: good morning. this topic focuses on me, on the issue of the press not focusing upon what government is building. the g.a.o. came out with a study about two or three months ago which said that the government is spending $100 billion plus a year for vacant federal buildings or for buildings that under law the g.s.a. does not

have the legal right to lease buildings such as in the world trade center for $30 million a year lease they still don't know what agency or function they're going to do. it's ridiculous. guest: in this case, the g.s.a. does control the property. they've controlled it since 2005 and they are trying to do something instead of letting it just sit there. obviously, the plan have become a little bogged down. host: share with our audience two of the photograph that's are accompanying your piece from bloomberg business week including a cemetery. one of the point you learned from this article is that the heat was left on for a number of years after the building closed. that contributed to the decay in the area. guest: it's important to step

back and consider why historic preservationist and why anybody care about st. elizabeth. it was founded in 1855 a famous social reformer. at the time, lot of people thought people that were mentally ill they warehouse them in almost prisons. the people at st. elizabeths, either let them outside and let them work in gardens. they let them get up on stages and act out roles from their leaves and all sorts of things considered very cutting edge and innovative at the time. also the hospital served as a

hospital for civil war soldiers and abraham lincoln used to go and visit them. it's just an incredible history there. the biggest building was designed by thomas walter who designed the capital dome and to get to your point. the policy for treating the mentally ill changed in the 1960's. the mentally ill were put back in the communities in these big hospitals. lot of the buildings fell under this use. the center building was designed by the architect capital dome. there's holes in the floors and holes in the ceilings. eventually that building will be restored as a center of the

department of homeland security. at one point, it's going to be beautiful but it's going to be very expensive too. host: the final price tag at the moment is what? guest: $4.5 billion. that surprised me too. that hasn't been written about before i did the story. i found that out at the end. i knew the price had gone up but that's pretty stunning. host: next is mark joining us from philadelphia. republican line. caller: i'm a university of penn grad. i took a keen interest on federal spending. i find amazing is my personal belief is d.o.d. and homeland security and intelligence agencies are private contractors

are using the federal treasurers as their own personal atm. they're all paybacks for its contribution to members of congress. is there any sequester hitting homeland security. edward snowden worked for allen, he was not a civil service employee. tell fox news that. this is what amazes me. this is nothing more than a money graby by private contractors. thank you. host: let me put that on the table. these private contractors and also those officially employed by the federal government the department of homeland security and the dhs coming together, estimated budget of about $36 billion and about 180,000 employees. here are the numbers today in

2013, 240,000 employees and a budget of nearly $60 billion. the caller's point about outside contractors and these numbers, your comment. guest: i want to say i'm a penn grad too. i think there's definitely issues with the dhs awarding contracts to politically connected contractors and also awarding -- entering contracts for technology and terrorism and fighting. i think it gets back to what they're trying to do at st. elizabeth, they trying to integrate all of those different federal agencies and make them more work better. most people would say that you need to do that to get it to

function better. the problem is where they chose to build the new headquarters. host: michael from chicago independent line good morning. caller: hi gentlemen. i disagree with the last caller about thighs -- these prevent contractors. if you go to secretary of state delaware, you put the united states in, it's a corporation. it is not a government. everybody is dumbing down the people of america. the united states is a corporation. washington d.c. is the federal enslave. that's a business, barack obama is the ceo. we need to give people minimum of $20 an hour for these jobs. the terrorists is in washington d.c. the congress and the president because they are not following

the constitution of the united states of america which belongs to we the people. host: devin leonard, did you want to respond to that sentiment? guest: i don't know where to start. that goes beyond my expertise. host: let me take one aspect of the caller's point. sense 9/11 there has been this industry created with regard to homeland security. guest: i don't think there's any question that that's true. one of the interesting things i deputy get into the story, basically st. elizabeth is almost 300 acres. the dhs is just developing the western part of it. there's also eastern part that district of columbia has been trying to develop.

they thought it would be, would be this whole sort of area of all of these contractors and stuff. basically, i guess, feed off the dhs. clearly the dhs has been wonderful and a lot of companies leak that. i don't think there's any question that's been a problem. also to get back to your earlier point, it's kind of amazing that you combine all of these agencies and still decade later, the budget nearly doubled and you have so many more employees. it does seem it's sort of burgeoning bureaucracy. again, that gets back to how do you manage it better and integrate it better and turn it into something that returns more sleekly. host: devin leonard is joining us from new york. this is what the piece looks

like. the department of homeland security is moving here. devin leonard did washington consider other options? other locations? guest: they did. about 14 different locations. none of them were big though. the question that some people say is well, wouldn't it make more sense is not be in washington and go in some place where you wouldn't have restrictions. the dhs wanted to be in washington. they wanted to be close to the white house. they chose this site and got these problems. host: you didn't talk about this in your piece. there's been a lot of discussion in washington of moving the fbi headquarters which is on pennsylvania avenue between the white house and u.s. capitol and moving that to d.c., virginia or

maryland. any discussion having dhs move into that property or rebuild on that site for the department of homeland security. guest: the discussion i heard is that, if you stop the dhs project, you can't completely stop the coast guard already there. if you don't continue with the rest of it, what do you do with the rest of the site. there are some people in congress talk about allowing the fbi to build a new headquarters there. i think right now the sentiment in congress is that we have sort of march ahead with this thing. it's been too much work done already by the dhs and the g.s.a. on the st. elizabeth campus. host: independent line. go ahead please. caller: good morning. we have the department of homeland security every year man handling and searching american citizens by hundreds of

thousands. we got the border that is wide open. this is like a man who screens up his house and deliberately leaves his backdoor open. this is not serious. all of resources we will put into building these new buildings, when we refurbish old buildings, they should take that an put it along the border. it just amazes us. host: devin leonard, your response. guest: when you talk to former dhs people and former heads of fema, former heads of i.c.e. and all other agencies when there would be a crisis, and anti-scare or potential shoe bombing. it spread all over d.c. and they don't have to drive to downtown d.c. traffic to meet with the

secretary of dhs. there's no question that's not a really good way for the dhs to be set up and probably be function better if everybody was put together in one place. i just think, especially in hind sight, there has to be a better and cheaper way to do it. there needs to be a faster way. clearly when you have all of these problems, the dhs needs to do a better job. the sooner everybody gets together, the better. host: i was going to point out one particular graph. in this story also available online. you talk about pre9/11 and we are today. you said the budget is nearly $59.96 billion and you can see the different agencies moving from pre-9/11 to where we are today. one of the things that is continually repeated in this piece, a unified culture,

working out of the same base. talking to each other in the hallway. meeting each other in the cafeteria. explain that sentiment from dhs and why it is so important in the creation of this new multibillion dollar office complex. guest: well, you'll hear that from a lot of companies that you want to get everybody together. you don't want everybody sitting around in their office. you need everyone collaborate. that sparks ideas and innovative thinking. i don't think there's any question that's what the dhs needs. also, you look at big companies that merge, often times one of the first things they do, they want to get everybody together and build a new headquarters. but the idea, you just can't have everybody sort of in

different geographic locations and it's like what's the point of merging, what's the point of creating this new agency if everybody is stuck in their cave. host: another graph to provide some comparison. you outlined the size of the pentagon and the property at st. elizabeth's. can you elaborate? guest: i don't have all of those figures in front of me. the pentagon is still a lot bigger than the new dhs headquarters. i think a lot of people will say and that comes up in the article, people of dhs said the department of defense -- all of the different agencies didn't come together until they were located in the pentagon and it was easy for people for people of the army and navy to get together and talk about things and talk about strategies and policies and that kind of thing.

it's the same philosophy. host: jack is joining us from michigan, our line of independents. good morning. caller: good morning. well, you know, somebody said a while ago, some gentleman was talking about the money graby by private contractors. they were paying $400 a gallon for gasoline. some prevent contractor was paying $400 a gallon when you can buy it at the pump for about a dollar a gallon. that's just what i think is a

money grab. money graby by the people and the private contractors working for the government. host: any comments? guest: i think there's definitely been issues with no good contracts at the dhs. i guess that sort of the usual suspects on the contracting side. they make a lot of money off the dhs. the bigger issue is dhs investing of money and things in things that don't work and that don't protect people. i think that's what people should be worried about more than just the expense. obviously, given the escalation, the size of dhs that's a concern

too. it's just sort of incredible. i mentioned in the story, biowatch and some of those other programs coming under fire for from congress because it's not working. i think that's more worrisome. host: which gets to another aspect of your story. let me quote the bloomberg business week column. you said the dhs is plagued by low moral. the pub service ranked department of homeland security at the bottom of its list of best places to work. why? guest: i have to say, if you look some surveys, the coast guard are pretty happy, the people at t.s.a. aren't.

it depends which one of the many agencies the dhs are looking at. it all averages out to the lowest score on that list. again, that's something that they need to fix. i think they've been trying to fix for a long time. some people think that getting people closer together, getting people to work and making the dhs one culture is the answer. but clearly, achieving that is a really tough thing. host: with regard to st. elizabeth, it's certainly more famous resident john hinckley linked the assassination attempt by of president reagan back in 1981. what does st. elizabeth encompass today? guest: well, there's a lot of stuff not being used on east side, the side the dhs isn't developing. the district of columbia runs the mental hospital.

it's pretty new. it's pretty small. it only has about 400 people. john hinckley is there. by the way since you mentioned john hinckley, he's not the only would-be presidential assassin who stayed there. the guy who killed president john garfield, he was an inmate there and there was also a fella who tried to kill andrew jackson and he was a resident too. so hinckley is carrying on a tradition i guess you want to call it that. host: matt is next, democrats line. caller: i find it interesting. i used to go by st. eves on the way to airport base to go swimming. any way my comment is homeland security to me is

completely out of control. i live three mile from the canadian border in northeastern washington. we've had three new border stations built and there's a $25 million building built on a wetland that's still unoccupied year after it was built. if you come up to our area after 6:00 in the evening, you'll find more homeland security border patrol vehicles than you'll find cars. the money that's being spent here is absolutely outrageous, depends, independents and republicans. it doesn't matter. we're all sick of it. it's just too much. if you got a problem on the border it's not up here, it's down on the mexican border.

guest: well, matt, i'm glad you called in and you brought that up. i actually was thinking about getting into that when i first started writing the story about dhs, the heavy security on the canadian border and trying to protect us from canada. i don't know a ton about that. i read about people camping in the northern parts of the united states and having drones flying over. in any case, it all seem like a little bit out of a michael moore movie. it's definitely something that we should probably be looking into more. it's really interesting and raises a lot of questions. host: we welcome our listeners on c-span radio who is heard coast to coast. wednesday, focus spotlight on magazine this week bloomberg business week and a look at the department of homeland security and its new offices scheduled to be built and finished in 2026.

13 years from now. devin leonard is joining us from new york. let me ask you about some of the debate here in washington immediately after 9/11 as congress overwhelming supporting the idea of the creation of this department but there were some skeptics including congressman john mica can you explain? guest: he said anybody that thinks can put 22 federal agencies together needs to have their head examined. he was a lone voice at the time. over time he look -- host: from indiana, good morning. caller: good morning. i like to make a comment gentleman just mentioned mr. john mica. he wrote the bible all through the t.s.a. basically. he said it's more or less a failure. it's all a money grab with their

friends winding up out front selling things like phony baloney moral, movies and videos. no wonder the country look at the t.s.a. as thousands standing around. the horrible moral is they would take an empty suit and if he's troubled, they'll move him around in the upper ranks. they need to investigate some of the warehouse where they brought corrupt companies and friends of the people at top and show exactly where all the waste and money is being wasted. additionally, you might check into how phony they have in-house television stations for moral for making movies that are

mandatory and they're training sessions which is a joke. which the train sessions, they'll run out hotels and it rivals the g.a.o. for the waste. these things go by the wayside because of the size. specifically one agency doesn't know what the other is doing. it's from the top down. i don't care, you had after 9/11 lot of paranoia and you had mcgall come in there. there's more investigation that needs to be done about this outfit. obviously the private sector, they did it before t.s.a. and they could upgrade things and work with the airlines and the communities to put people who are serious about having a job

back to work at the airports. host: let me take his comment. this is from fred, where is the waste, fraud and abuse in the department and what needs to be cut? guest: it's a huge department and i didn't really take a look at the budget and decide what could be cut or not. i do want to say -- responding to the caller about the t.s.a. congressman mica has been looking into all of this stuff and has issued all of these reports and lot of the things he was talking about. i don't know how much that's going to change things. i know he's been an advocate for privatizing what t.s.a. does. i guess the question is, ultimately we know what's going

to happen. host: next caller is from montana, paul is on the line democrats line. caller: good morning. i like to -- if at all possible -- intersect some humor into this discussion. i find it absolutely appropriate that dhs wants to relocate on the grounds of mental institution because frankly in my opinion, the very existence of dhs is crazy. that is my comment. host: thank you for the call. devin leonard? guest: well, i think some best lines in the story are from people at dhs talking about i guess some of the comedic aspects of moving the department of homeland security, the former mental hospital. actually this wasn't in the story, the head of dhs told me, he and the project manager were talking about how in the

original sort of building where the secretary eventually going to have his or her office. that office is going to be where the mental institution superintendent -- the inmates all lived there too. they had strategy sort of putting the most furthest away from the superintendent office which is also where the superintendent also lived and the head of real estate. that might be a bad thing for the department of homeland security. may be we should put the agencies on the furthest extremes. he said, this isn't the story, this will make a great hg tv project show renovating the building. even though they finished their project in one episode. i actually thought there was a lot of funny stuff in the story. i know a lot of people read it.

i think they had a mixture of hilarious and then depressed. host: mary is our next caller from rome, new york, independent line. caller: thank you for taking my call. in regards to this renovating and what it's going to cost, i can understand because even here in rome, they renovated a department for the mentally disabled. they now able to put mentally disabled in there. when they renovated it and they

closed it up, i think it was in the late 1960's and 1970's, excuse me, they did the whole thing completely. the floors already been done previously. but they had one chip in a section of this one floor and they took it all up just changed the whole thing instead of just replacing it. exactly the same thing was down there in the first place. i know because i talked to people -- when the construction was done. guest: there are laws that governing historic preservation and the dhs really has to follow

all the work with the historic preservation to restore all the buildings. they are protected. i think it probably -- i assume it dries up the cost of the project but i guess they didn't have to buy the land or buy the building because the g.s.a. already owned them. they're doing a very painstaking job opinion some of the -- some of the buildings that were renovated were beautifully done. i don't necessarily think they're wasting the money or doing that badly. it's just slows everything down. they had to work out agreements with all of the people and stakeholders on that site. they probably would have been better serve to start from

scratch far away from washington d.c. host: this is what the piece looks like from bloomberg business week. the department of homeland security is moving here. devin leonard joining us from new york. thanks very much for being with us. caller: thanks for having me. host: we have a couple minutes before we take you live with the state department with secretary of state john kerry. some breaking news we want to share with you, the president has canceled his meeting with president putin. scheduled to take place after the g20 summit which is taking place in st. pittsburgh, russia. but the moscow meeting has been canceled. thanks very much for being with us. explain the announcement and why this morning? >> this move has been in the works for a couple days. we've been told the press secretary jay carney expect a

formal announcement over the next few days about the state of the trip. at the do of questions to this point about what would happen. it has seem putin grant temporary asylum for edward snowden. it seemed as though it was likely the white house might want to send a sign by not setting up a special meeting with putin during the g20 visit. >> let me read to you just a portion of the statement from the white house press secretary that came out just about 40 minutes ago. the press secretary saying given our lack of progress on issues such as missile defense and arms control, trade and commercial relation, global security issue and human rights in the last 12 months, we informed the russian government we believe it will be more construct everred to postpone the summit until we have more results from our shared agenda. >> of course another action that was mentioned in there was the decision by russia to grant

snowden asylum as well. carney saying russia december appointing decision to grant snowden temporary asylum. last night the president saying he was disappointed in the move. >> the president will still travel to st. petersburg russia and explain the difference between that summit meeting and this bilateral in moscow. >> that's right. the g20 summit has been scheduled for st. petersburg. the president will travel to that and putin will be there as well. the significant is he's not going to meet with him separately either. it's not going to be a separate bilateral summit where they discuss issues. it's been interesting to note when there have been meetings with obama and putin the kind